Exhibition: Remains of a summer bliss

Bill Balaskas

Remains of a summer bliss

Curator: Lanfranco Aceti

Past

15 September – 15 October 2016

11 Haritos Street, Kolonaki

Venue

KALFAYAN GALLERIES | ATHENS

11 Haritos Street
106 75 Kolonaki
Athens

Press Release

Link

Kalfayan Galleries (11 Haritos Street, Kolonaki, Athens) present the solo exhibition of GreekLondon-based artist Bill Balaskas, titled ‘Remains of a Summer Bliss’. The exhibition is curatedby Boston-based curator, artist and academic Lanfranco Aceti. The opening will be held onThursday 15 September 2016, 20:00 – 22:00.In his second solo exhibition at Kalfayan Galleries, Bill Balaskas will present a new body of workthat will invite the audience to experience the end of summer as a metaphor for the present.Remaining faithful to his ideologically charged, yet playful artistic language, which has receivedwide international acclaim in recent years, Balaskas interrogates what might constitute “bliss” inthe current historical conjuncture.

Using a variety of media, including neon, photography, sound and fabric, the artist willinvestigate what remains from an old world that appears to be dying, and what remains to bedone in order to build a new one. Like items abandoned on a beach by holidaymakers, theworks in the exhibition will be testaments to this complex, or even contradictory amalgamation.Together they will signal the enduring volatility of a globalized environment in which anydirection taken cannot guarantee the reaching of the desired destination anymore. Incontradistinction to the dominant apolitical culture which proclaims that “ignorance is bliss”,Balaskas’s works make us confront reality in order to reflect on the origins of the uncertaintythat we experience.The curator of the exhibition, Lanfranco Aceti, notes: “Balaskas is one of the most excitingpolitically and socially engaged artists working in Europe today. Behind the humorous surface ofmany of his works, we can locate multiple references and layers of meaning. Those referencesreveal the violence exerted on our societies by the crisis of the political and economic systemsthat we have created, or perverted. Balaskas looks for the constituent elements of this crisis, inorder to produce a space for civic introspection – a condition that we so urgently need in Europeand around the world.”Concurrently with his solo exhibition at Kalfayan Galleries, works by Bill Balaskas can also beviewed at MACBA, Barcelona, where the artist presents a new installation commissioned by themuseum, titled ‘Anarchy Near the UK’ (exhibition: ‘PUNK. Its traces in contemporary art’);Fundació Palma Espai d’Art–Casal Solleric, Palma de Mallorca (exhibition: ‘De regreso a laisla’); A Plus A Gallery, Venice (exhibition: ‘Good Night, And Good Luck’); and in Boston, whereBalaskas will stage a large-scale public performance in collaboration with Boston University, on30 September (ArtWeek Boston 2016). The performance will feature Balaskas’s widelypublicized installation ‘The market will save us’ (2013), and it is curated by Lanfranco Aceti.

Artists

Bill Balaskas

Bill Balaskas (b. Thessaloniki, Greece, 1983) is a London-based artist working across different media.
Balaskas is a research student in the MPhil/PhD programme (2011-2014) in Critical Writing in Art &
Design at the Royal College of Art, London and holds an MA (2010) in Communication Art & Design from
the same college. In 2008 he earned a BA (Hons) in Video Arts Production from the University for the
Creative Arts, Maidstone (UK), and in 2004 a BSc in Economics from Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
(Greece). Balaskas’ work has been widely exhibited internationally. Recent solo exhibitions include
presentations at the Institut Français de Thessalonique (3rd Thessaloniki Biennale of Contemporary Art),
Thessaloniki (2011); Jewish Museum, London; and Sketch Gallery, London (both 2010). Recent group
exhibitions and screenings include presentations at Berwick Film & Media Arts Festival; World Event
Young Artists – London 2012 Cultural Olympiad, Nottingham (representing the UK); Maribor – European
Capital of Culture 2012, Maribor (representing the UK); Talbot Rice Gallery, Edinburgh (all 2012);
Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts, New York; Leeds International Film Festival, Leeds (both 2011);
Musée des Abattoirs, Toulouse; British Film Institute, London; and A Foundation, Liverpool (all 2010).
Furthermore, Balaskas is an awarded writer (British Council of Greece, 2005) and screenwriter (Houston
International Film Festival, 2006), as well as guest editor of the most prominent academic journal in the
field of New Media Art, the Leonardo Electronic Almanac (The MIT Press). In April 2012, the Global
Board of Contemporary Art nominated him for the ALICE Award (‘People’s Voice Award’ Winner). Bill
Balaskas is represented by Kalfayan Galleries (Athens – Thessaloniki).

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